Making Your Hobbies Work for You

The title of this post is a little misleading when put with the photograph above as it gives the impression that baking is my hobby, when in actual fact it isn't. Quite the opposite in fact. I just wanted to get across the idea that sometimes what you do in your leisure time can double up as a money earner.

Back in January, my daughter and I went on a fabulous bread making course at The Artisan Bakehouse in West Sussex. I didn't blog about it before because I knew it would make a great feature for The People's Friend. Although I'm better known for being one of their regular fiction writers, I have, on occasion, written articles for them when the mood takes me. .. and this was one of those times.

I sent my pitch to the features editor to see what he thought and caught him just as he was about to go to a meeting with the rest of his team (now that's what I call good timing). He pitched it to them and luckily they all liked the idea and told me to go ahead and write it. The resulting feature, Better Baking, is in the latest People's Friend Special (out this week). The full feature has a picture of my daughter kneading dough. I'm not sure whether she'll thank me for including it but, hey ho, that's what comes of having a writer for a mother.

Anyway, the point I want to make is that although the things you do outside of your writing life might seem everyday, or uninteresting to you, they may be of great interest to someone else. I could easily have been put off writing this feature as many people already know how to make bread, but the secret is to put you own spin on it. In my case, it was the fact that I am completely useless at baking. In order to give the features editor a clue as to the slant I would be taking, I gave the pitch the title 'Can't Bake, Will Bake'.

After reading my feature yesterday, it gave me an idea for another which I pitched today, so keep your fingers crossed.

My baking day also resulted in a short story... if I manage to sell it, I will have got back the money I paid for the workshop. A bonus!

The other lovely thing is that in the same issue of the magazine, I also have two short stories (It's certainly given me a boost in a week when the novel writing has felt like a bit of a slog).

Neither of my stories are hobby related... but I do have a garden and a dog!